timid mandarin

[t4zalews]

Is anyone else's mandarin really timid? Mine barely comes out from behind the rocks and when she does..if I go toward the tank, she immediately retreats to the back of the tank. Could this be from the flame angel aggression?

Besides this the fish is great.

 

[rort]

i have a pair in my tank for almost 6 months and they do the same thing. I notice that when my dawn/dusk lights to moonlights are on that is when they are most active and not so timid (hiding in the rocks).

 

[klepto]

Which species of mandarin do you have?

I work with some larger tanks and the S. spendidus are quite shy and always hide when I feed. I doubt they are hiding because of aggression, they just prefer to hide in the rockwork, out of our grasp! But all the activity that feeding usually involves may encourage the mandarin to hide. I think this will vary widely.

Is your fish eating frozen?

 

[AquaKnight]

My S. picturatus is over 4 years old in my care. I can count the number of times I've probably seen her on my hands and toes. I've sat and watched long enough, till she comes out. She doesn't immediately scurring into the rocks, just briskly swim off.

She's been in 3 different tanks with 3 different sets of tankmates, so it's not them.

 

[Airwolf75]

Mine used to do that, then I started leaving frozen shrimp for it, then it figured out I was the bringing of shrimp, now it begs for food and is fed by hand. The whole proces took like 8 months to go from recluse to begger.

 

[flameangel88]

I acquired a S. Splendidus 10 days ago from a lfs and since intro to the tank he's always swimming around looking for pods on the glass, rocks and on the sandbed even when I'm right in front of the tank. I've been reluctant in buying one for the past two years but I saw this one in the frag tank that the store just broke down and moving to a new tank but the Mandarin was left behind. The owner said it's been in there for sometime so I figure it's been conditioned with people passing by everyday. However, it will be a challenge to get this one to eat prepared food since the frag tank didn't have any fish in there and I never saw any feeding in that tank when I'm in there. I only have one other fish in the there so I'm sure this helps also.

 

[sanchoy]

This is hit or miss.. more misses though..

Most mandarins tend to hide and are reclusive.